Canada’s international trade policy prioritizes the Gateways model with a view to increasing trade with Asia, especially China. Meanwhile, Industry Canada pursues research on global value chains, looking at how trade occurs inside binational and multinational companies. Russ Kuykendall raises questions about the net benefit to Canada from the China-focused gateways trade. He affirms the strengths of the global value chains model, but asks whether it provides an adequate explanation of trade. Instead, Kuykendall proposes that the Trade corridors model best explains Canada-US trade — Canada’s most important trading relationship — and that the model suggests where Canada should pursue development of trade.   October 3, 2007, marks the 20th anniversary of the completion of the negotiation of the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement that was signed on January 2, 1988, and came into effect January 1, 1989. Twenty years ago, the focus of Canada’s international trade policy was the United States economy, the largest market on the globe. Today, three metaphors inform policy models of Canada’s international trade and the integration of its economy with the world: gateways, global value chains and trade corridors. The metaphors emanate from at least three separate departments of the federal government. The Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade — specifically, the Ministry of International Trade — are pursuing a Gateways model, particularly focused on Canada’s trade with the Asia-Pacific rim. Recently, the federal Department of Industry has sought to drill down on how especially Canada-US trade occurs within corporate entities with the concept of “global value (supply) chains.” Particularly in the mid- to late 1990s, the federal Department of Transport focused its policy development efforts on using “trade corridors” as a means of understanding Canada’s infrastructure needs in respect of trade. This article is an overview of each trade metaphor, including strengths and weaknesses of each and how they serve the Canadian economy. The focus shifts to the ability of trade corridors to account for the strengths of the other metaphors, and how Canada’s largest export sectors or trade corridors are focused on the US market. Challenges arising from the three most valuable trade corridors are summarized and, then, how recent public policy has affected them. Finally, “the Canadian advantage” that arises from Canada’s trade corridors is described — factors that position Canada favourably in respect of international trade with the United States, in particular. Throughout the Chrétien and Martin governments, the gateways metaphor featured prominently, especially as Prime Minister Chrétien organized a series of Team Canada delegations. The most prominent of these was a series of trade delegations to the People’s Republic of China (PRC), beginning in 1994 with provincial premiers and CEOs in tow, that served to highlight agreements already formalized and business already underway among Canadian companies operating in China. Gateways is focused on the Asia-Pacific rim, and especially on the PRC. This is not without good reason. The PRC market represents one of the great consumer growth markets in the world with well over a billion potential consumers. India similarly represents a huge consumer growth market, also in the Asia-Pacific rim. Roll in the mature markets of Japan, Australia, New Zealand, the United States and Canada, the Asian tigers of Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia as well as Latin America’s Pacific coast, and the combined Pacific rim consumer market totals more than 3 billion people, or approximately half the globe’s population. More than 80 percent of this market constitutes a consumer growth market, versus the mature markets of Canada, the US, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. It’s worth pointing out: the Asia- Pacific market is worth understanding. But does the Gateways metaphor add to our understanding of trade in this market, and is it adequate to encompass it? Beyond this, what is the value added to the Canadian economy from Canada’s trading in the Asia-Pacific rim, especially with the PRC? In “Six Trade Corridors to the US: the Lifeblood of Canada’s Economy” (Policy Options, July-August 2006), I argued that the advantage on trade and the growth in that advantage on trade with China goes to China. This is true of both US and Canadian trade with China. Year over year the rate of increase in China’s trade surplus with Canada and the US is not in the single but double digits. In 2005, Canada’s merchandise trade deficit with China was $22.4 billion. In 2006, the deficit was $26.8 billion — a rise of nearly 20 percent. Most of China’s surplus is represented in consumer manufactured goods targeting the US and Canadian markets. Canada’s trade deficit with China tends to be offset by commodities: food (grains and oilseeds), petroleum, coa, and iron. Canadian and US retailers have effectively shifted large segments of their consumer goods supply chain offshore to China. Wal-Mart may be only the most notable example. While trade deficits with China continue to mount up, Canada’s merchandise trade surplus with the US was $141.7 billion in 2006. Japan has long enjoyed a trade surplus with the US and Canada. Again, with Canada, the deficit is offset by Canada’s supplying commodities. Japan’s domination of the US and Canada automobile products market is represented in Toyota Motor Company’s surpassing General Motors as the highest- selling automobile manufacturing company in the world. Whereas companies like Honda had to work very hard to find US and Canadian dealers in the early stages of its North American market entry, now the shoe is on the other foot with dealers taking less and giving more. Toyota and Nissan’s penetration of the US and Canadian markets is so wide and deep that the companies’ attentions are shifting to the PRC and Indian, markets with deals to manufacture and supply cars to these “cheap car” markets. Even so, there’s enough room in the North American market for such interlopers as Hyundai to move from the entry stage to a brand with growing equity among US and Canadian consumers. Waiting in the wings for North American entry is a relative newcomer (within the last five years) to car manufacturing, Tata Motors, which has long manufactured trucks for the Indian market. Tata has effectively recreated the “cheap car” market focusing, first, on its domestic consumer market in India, but it is well along entry into the Australian, New Zealand, Russian, eastern and central as well as western European, and the potentially huge Latin American markets. India’s engineering acumen and capacity rivals that of Japan, western Europe and North America. India’s cars are coming soon to a dealer near you! The Gateways metaphor is one that emphasizes opening up Canada in return for opening up opportunities off-shore in the Asia-Pacific rim, especially the PRC. But, again, this openness has translated into growing trade deficits as Canadian and US consumer demand for cheap manufactured goods from (for example) China and higher quality manufactured goods from Japan outpace reciprocal demand for goods of Canadian or US manufacture. The recent expansions of capacity at the ports of Prince Rupert and Vancouver, and the expansions of highway and rail transportation capacity, have focused on container traffic of manufactured goods mainly coming into and commodities traffic heading out from Canada’s Pacific shores. Further, most public policy in relation to the Gateways metaphor, including the series of policy forums on Gateways spearheaded by Simon Fraser University, focuses on making Canada’s transportation infrastructure accessible to the Asia- Pacific trade. The abstract from one of a series of conferences on the “Gateway Corridor Initiative” organized by Simon Fraser University is revealing on this count. Out of some 23 presentations, virtually all concerned themselves with transportation infrastructure. Measured by the ratio of exports to GDP, Canada’s economy is the second most open to trade among the G8. Measured by the ratio of total trade (exports and imports) to GDP, Canada is, again, second among the G8. The value of Canada’s exports represents 36.4 percent of Canada’s GDP, compared to 44.9 percent for Germany’s. They value of Canada’s total trade is equivalent to 70.2 percent of GDP, compared to 84.5 percent for Germany, according to Canada’s State of Trade. The OECD struggles to measure China’s GDP, so the ratio of exports to GDP is difficult to calculate. But in the Asia Times Online, Lynette Ong estimates that the ratio of China’s exports to GDP is double that of India’s. Ong suggests that India’s growth is traceable to domestic entrepreneurship while China’s is due to higher levels of foreign direct investment. According to a 2007 report in Xinhua, since the country opened to it in 1978, China’s foreign direct investment (FDI) cumulatively exceeded US$750 billion by the end of June, including US$36.93 billion in FDI in the first seven months of 2007, according to Vice Minister of Commerce Wei Jianguo. He said China had cumulatively approved creation of 610,000 foreign-funded enterprises. Exports by foreign-funded enterprises accounted for 57 percent of China’s exports. Further, while much of China’s growth is traceable to suppliers focused on serving the North American markets who locate in China, India’s growth is primarily focused on supplying domestic demand. The following questions could be posed in respect of the Government of Canada’s current Gateways, transportation infrastructure focus: ● As long as Gateways is the metaphor informing Canada’s Asia-Pacific trade policy, will Canada focus on leveraging access to its market for Asian-manufactured goods in return for access to especially Asian and Latin American markets for Canada’s higher-valueadded goods and services? ● Are Asian and Latin American markets the best target markets for Canada’s high-value-added, hightechnology goods and services? ● While the Canadian market for Asian-manufactured goods is driven by Canadian consumer demand, is the expenditure of Canadian public monies the best investment in Canada’s consumer, business, macro-economic and national interests? ● Is there an untapped opportunity for Canadian investors and exporters in India’s market? The North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) was adopted by the United States, Canada and Mexico in 1997 in the aftermath of the ratification of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) by all three countries. The system makes it possible to track exports and imports of all three, sector by sector, and compare “apples to apples” and “oranges to oranges.” The NAICS is organized, sector by sector, from broadest to narrower and narrower categories. Global value chains — formerly known as global supply chains — research narrows further within sectors and attempts to get at how trade occurs inside or within bi-national or multi/national companies, especially those operating in the US and Canada. Because these transactions are internal to companies operating on both sides of the Canada-US border, the research requires a high level of cooperation from companies that are Industry Canada’s research targets. A global supply chains conference was held in February 2006 in Ottawa for public servants in the Department of Industry, and a global value chains conference was slated for senior economic policy authorities from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) member countries, policy analysts from the Federal Government, as well as representatives from businesses, think tanks, and academia, in September 2007. Industry Canada and others are attempting to understand how this variety of trade — trade internal to companies — occurs: the management relationships and best practices, as well as transportation infrastructure and arrangements. Whether intentional or not, global value chains research takes a page from Adam Smith’s understanding of trade in The Wealth of Nations as, in part, division of labour and his discussion of the advantages of importation of certain products over domestic production — in this case, within companies, in order to maximize profits. The clearest advantage to this approach is that it widens its view beyond transportation infrastructure, and starts to get at how trade occurs, especially in terms of management and best practices. It recognizes that trade is more than transportation infrastructure. Further, global value chains research begins to paint a picture of how the Canadian and US economies are integrated by trade — at least, how a business enterprise operating on both sides of the USCanada border integrates its operations by way of trade internal to the enterprise. Global value chains research offers a microcosm, company by company, of how the Canadian and US economies are integrated, sector by sector — especially in respect of the Ontario-Michigan automobile manufacturing industry. The information collected should be extraordinarily useful in adding to our understanding of Canada-US trade. But it is necessarily limited by focusing its research scope on bi-national and multinational enterprises. Further, while it is not as limited in scope as the Gateways project, focused as it is on transportation infrastructure, global value chains research does not (yet, anyway) address the influence of contractual, regulatory, statutory and treaty arrangements, let alone matters of culture and human relationships. As I wrote last summer in Policy Options: Global supply (value) chain research points to how Canada’s trade is organized mainly in terms of businesses, offering a description of Canada’s trade flows. It is helpful. But this presents an inadequate explanation by itself of Canada’s trade capable of informing and providing direction to Canada’s international trade policy. The concept of Trade Corridors was first developed in Canada as a public policy project of the federal Department of Transport in the late 1990s. For some time earlier, Trade Corridors had been adopted by a number of regional Canada-US trade marketing initiatives describing themselves as Trade Corridors. But Trade Corridors were consistently described and defined in terms of transportation infrastructure and transportation routes. The Work Research Foundation departed from this limited understanding of Trade Corridors with its book Greenlighting Trade: A Trade Corridors Atlas. Using the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) and the Harmonized System (HS) data at Trade Data Online, and certain other data from Industry Canada and Statistics Canada, Greenlighting Trade identified Canada’s six highest value export markets, how these are focused on the United States as a destination, and how they tended to integrate the Canadian and US economies. “Six Trade Corridors to the US: The Lifeblood of Canada’s Economy” (Policy Options, July-August 2006) provides a summary of the arguments while Greenlighting Trade presents the detailed sector-by-sector research, and organizes it into a number of useful graphs and charts giving a “snapshotat- a-glance” of Canada-US trade. Greenlighting Trade examines Canada’s six largest export markets organized by sector under the broadest categories of the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) and the Harmonized System (HS). These markets are described as six Trade Corridors, beginning with the highest value export sectors: automobile manufacturing, oil and gas products, machinery and equipment manufacturing, forest products, commercial services, and food (agriculture and fishing products). A definition of Trade Corridors was developed that endeavours to include and encompass not only the matters addressed under Gateways or Global Supply Chains, but also matters not included: Trade corridors are more than transportation infrastructure. Therefore, trade corridors are defined as streams of products, services, and information moving within and through communities in geographic patterns according to a matrix or “culture” of trade agreements and treaties, statutes, delegated legislation, and customs that govern and guide trading relationships, institutions, and structures. With this definition, Greenlighting Trade attempts to understand Canada-US trade — and global trade, for that matter — in all its facets and fullness. This is an attempt to move the discussion from merely one of infrastructure and products — important as they are — to the role of contracts and the rule of law as well as the human elements of culture and relationships that frame and provide the contexts for trade. This understanding of trade can help to prioritize trade on a basis other than solely the value of exports and trade surpluses and deficits. It helps to understand why a trading relationship as Canada-US trade exists, and why it is so large. It also explains how trade tends to integrate the Canadian and US economies. Trade Corridors offers clues to other potentially fruitful trade relationships, bringing these into the prioritization of trading relationships. Taking a cue from the example of the most valuable trading relationship in the world and, perhaps, in recorded history — Canada-US trade conclusions can be drawn based on what makes this relationship, first, possible and then so fruitful. The most fruitful trading relationships will tend to entail geographic proximity; the similarity of legal systems and statutory/regulatory structure; the quality of international relations and treaties between governments; openness to exports and imports and to direct foreign investment; the similarity of business and trading cultures and contractual relationships; and the web and network of personal relationships on a human level. Therefore, Canada may want to prefer trade with India with its quarter billion English-speakers and common law legal system over trade with the PRC. The Trade Corridors framework provides an explanation of how Canada’s trading emphasis shifted away from Britain to the US in the 19th and 20th centuries. It takes into account the impacts of Canada’s geographic proximity to the US over the United Kingdom as well as the US and Canada’s shared history of adherence to common law and the sanctity of contracts, and the millions of human relationships among US and Canadian and US-Canadian dual citizens. There is more to say about the advantages that Canada enjoys in respect of its trade with the United States. In Greenlighting Trade and since its publication, a number of opportunities and challenges were identified for Canada’s six most valuable export Trade Corridors markets. Following are the challenges and opportunities of the three most valuable of these, namely automobile manufacturing, oil and gas products and machinery and equipment The Canada and US auto industries are, in fact, the North American auto industry centred in Ontario and Michigan. This industry represents approximately one-fifth of the total value of Canada’s exports. More than onequarter of Canada-US trade crosses at the Ambassador Bridge, Windsor-Detroit. The industry was formerly governed mainly by the Auto Pact, 1965, but is now governed by the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement and the North American Free Trade Agreement and the attached regulations and tribunals. The highway transportation infrastructure serving the industry is further stressed because the Niagara peninsula (Canada) has become the transportation route of choice between New England and the US Midwest for US truckers and for US tourists and students. The St. Lawrence Seaway and its infrastructure are subject to a Canada-US treaty and a binational commission, the International Joint Commission, established in 1909. As vessels have increased in size, significant expansion of the seaway has not been forthcoming. The 2007 federal budget privileged hybrid auto manufactures over non-hybrids and higher gasoline consumption vehicles. Tax credits were made available to the former, and tax levies were announced on the latter. This effectively privileged Toyota — with its emphasis on hybrids over Daimler-Chrysler — with its recent revival of “the hemi” engine. A North American auto industry already under pressure is feeling that pressure all the more. US demand for oil and gas continues to ramp up, matched in production by Canada’s oil and gas industry, centred in Alberta (see the accompanying illustrations). The oil sands reserves of northeastern Alberta of bitumen that can be processed into crude, and the Elmworth gas fields of northwestern Alberta that straddle the Alberta-BC border, may represent the largest proven reserves of oil and gas in the world. Near Peace River, Alberta, is another site with huge potential for bitumen extraction already in the early stages of development. Recent concerns about greenhouse gases and oil and gas consumption will tend — at least in the short to medium term — to put pressure on the industry. Extraction of bitumen generally requires the consumption of natural gas, with the attendant production of greenhouse gases. For years, policy analysts have suggested the construction of a CANDU reactor near Fort McMurray and the oil sands extraction sites in northeastern Alberta, and near the projected oil sands sites in northwestern Alberta. A recent proposal would have seen the construction of a reactor near Whitecourt in northwestern Alberta, but the residents recently voted against it. As a result, Energy Alberta announced at the end of August 2007 that it is applying for “a Licence to Prepare Site with the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission” situated near Peace River. From beginning the approvals process through construction to a CANDU being up and running will take up to ten years. Alberta is effectively becoming a “super-province” on the order of Ontario because of its economic prowess from oil and gas, spin-offs, and from other infrastructure expenditures in health care. But Alberta doesn’t enjoy the same kind of clout as Ontario in Parliament and the federal government. This requires addressing, and the aspirational culture of Alberta that tends to legitimize Alberta’s political expectations. In certain quarters of the broad machinery and equipment sector, there seems to be some lack of appreciation for the magnitude of the valueadded and the multiplier effect of Canada’s high-technology engineering sector in space, satellite, aerospace, communications and robotics technology. Other countries capable of such technology — and it’s a relatively short list — actively support and privilege their players in this sector over foreign competitors. Even with a commitment to free trade, should the Government of Canada do any differently as long as other governments privilege domestic participants? Increased US concerns with security add an extra hurdle in respect of technology sharing and the involvement of Canadian engineers and scientists born off-shore from Canada in countries considered suspect by the US government. This could also serve as an advantage to Canada in making it a more attractive destination for hightech engineers and scientists who would be barred from certain kinds of pure and applied research in the US under its ITAR regime. For several years, the Alberta government has promoted “the Alberta Advantage” — in business, its regulatory regime, its access to energy, for professionals, and in terms of overall quality of life. Here is “the Canadian advantage” — Canada’s trade assets identified by employing a Trade Corridors analysis: ● Canada shares a continent with the US: this gives Canada immediate geographic access to the largest economy in the world; ● Canada shares time zones with the US: the business day, banking and securities markets operate on the same time zones in both countries. Canadians and Americans work, go to school, and carry on their daily lives concurrently; ● Canada and the US share the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence Seaway: Canada and the US share access and management of the St. Lawrence Seaway and the great inland transportation waterways of the Great Lakes; ● Canada and the US share a common language, English, and both are bilingual. Over the years, several prominent news anchors in the US have been Canadians, most notably the late Peter Jennings. That is because spoken English in one is generally understood in the other. Canada possesses a linguistic bridge to la francophonie — French-speaking countries throughout the world. The US possesses a linguistic bridge to iberophones — Spanish-speakers, by way of its large Hispanic and Mexican population; ● Shared legal framework — the common law — and both have jurisdictions that employ the civil code or Napoleonic Code (Quebec and Louisiana). Although differences between the legal regimes are present, the general adherence to the sanctity of contract informed by a majority common law regime tends to facilitate trade and business transactions between the two countries; ● Shared popular and mass culture. Canadians are knowledgeable of American pop culture. Several Canadians are American cultural icons. Both share similar spectator and participatory sports interests in baseball, football and golf. When their entrepreneurs meet, they have common ground and subjects to discuss in breaking the ice while they play the links; ● Shared electrical power grid. Hydro-Quebec sells power through the US northeast grid. Both use electricity in the same way; ● Shared and highly integrated transportation network of air, sea, rail and roads. Major Canadian airports have pre clearance facilities, and there is discussion of creating pre-clearance facilities for highway and rail border crossings; ● Shared communications grid of telephone, cellular service, Black- Berry and Internet; ● Highly mobile work forces. Canadians and Americans are among the most highly educated peoples in the world, and their credentials, skills and ways of doing business are highly transferable, country to country. This is further enhanced by the NAFTA worker visa; ● Security, police and armed forces integration and exchanges; and ● Similar systems of advanced education. Canada and the US take similar approaches to public education, and their universities are similarly structured. No trading relationship is perfect. As the two-way trade in goods and services between Canada and the United States approaches $2 billion each and every day, trade irritants are likely to arise. If Canada and the US are treated as a trading bloc, the value of its trade is exceeded only by the EU-25, or by all of Asia considered as one trading bloc. The two economies possess highly integrated transportation, communications, financial, business, cultural, military and family networks, and highly similar statutory, regulatory, civil, judicial, political and governmental frameworks. Sector by sector, corridor by corridor, bilateral trade serves to integrate the Canadian and US economies. This integration is mutually beneficial, with the advantage at present going to Canada, with its trade surplus. Canada must guard and enhance its chief trading relationship while seeking to initiate and grow other trading relationships. Taking as a model its trading relationship with the US, Canada should target economies where it holds in common characteristics that will pave the way for mutually beneficial trade and economic integration. Trade Corridors is the best model for understanding how Canada-US occurs at present, for understanding how trade integrates the two economies, and for identifying Canada’s best markets for future trade expansion.   Russ Kuykendall is senior researcher with the Work Research Foundation (www.wrf.ca), which organized the Trade Corridors Roundtable in Ottawa on September 11 with industry, business, and public policy leaders. rkuykendall@wrf.ca

I grew up in the country, the kind of place that some uncharitably call “the middle of nowhere.” Work was long and hot, and the church, that building at the center of a sprawling agricultural community, was an educator, social hub, and helper. The connection between the church and the land was easy enough to figure out. It was commonplace on a Sunday morning to give thanks for land, to pray for it, and to live with the dignity of a very earthy Christianity.In North America it seems that urban abstractions have destabilized this kind of intimate spirituality of land and community. How many residents of a new American suburb are liable to offer an earthy and robust thanks for their square patch of lawn, identically sculpted to fit the pattern of an endless row of McMansions? Or who might stare out of their high rise in Los Angeles to see a maze of granite, concrete, and the world’s most expansive road works and feel compelled to enter this kind of spiritual space?The urban paradox is this: Where human beings are most concentrated, and most capable of building and sustaining God-glorifying community, our urban structures and planning have often erected colossal artificial barriers to it. Wendell Barry, a Christian author, criticizes this new divide as unnatural and unbiblical. In his essay collection The Gift of Good Land, he writes, “I want to deal, at last, with my own long-held belief that Christianity as usually presented by its organizations, is not earthly enough; that a valid spiritual life … must have a practice and a practicality.” It must have a material result. It must reflect on God’s love for creation and the call of God to love our neighbors. Rightly then, these requirements cannot be fulfilled by smiling in abstract beneficence on our neighbors and on our scenery. It must come to tangible acts, which come from skills. Such love, Barry writes, calls for the study of agriculture, soil husbandry, engineering, architecture, mining, and manufacturing. “It calls not just for skills but for the study and criticism of skills, because in all of them a choice must be made.” How can we love our neighbor if we don’t know how to build or mend a fence, or how to keep filth out of his water and poison out of his air?Further, it makes biblical sense that if the earth is the Lord’s and we are His stewards, there are good and bad ways of doing community. We are right to ask: Is there such a thing as a Christian strip mine? A Christian transit system? Or a Christian waste disposal system? Does Christianity imply limitations on the scale of architecture, roadways, and residential complexes?If we are to recover an earthy Christianity, one that connects profoundly to streets, homes, and land, then we must agree, at the very least, that there are possible answers to these questions. And we must reject the argument that the Christian tradition does not provide an understanding of such commonplace issues. Biblical Christianity is about land, about subways, cars, and high rises. It affirms God as Creator, and as sovereign over every bit of creation. Therefore our responsibility as stewards, as those who have been given dominion, is to safeguard God’s work, and His pleasure in it. Our concern is that God be pleased when He looks to our cities.It is irrevocably human to build cities. Living in cities, in community, is part of being human. The Bible affirms this, but it further affirms that all such activity exists, as Luther would say, Corem Deo—before the face of God, and to the glory of God. Our concern for His honor is at the heart of decoding the urban paradox.To this end, New Urbanism flags some of the most salient urban issues in contemporary North America. At the very least it diagnoses the mess that plagues many cities, and proposes some solutions. And, importantly, New Urbanism tells us that the problem is not money. North America is affluent, capable of marshaling colossal resources. Yet our cities and suburban centers no longer seem to support human flourishing?they are often ugly, and dominated by consumerism and big box retailers. We must become theologically alert to the simple but disarming truth that cities can honor God.Church and City: Where did the Connection Go? Among urban geographers it has become clich? to say that a city's soul is its tallest building. It doesn't take a much historical imagination to remember that churches once dominated the urban skylines where banks and business towers now loom. Churches don't stand out in cities anymore, architecturally or otherwise, in much of the global North. Those that do, in Europe for example, often stand more as relics than sites of faith or centers of vibrant urban renewal.In Canada, Reginald Bibby, a sociologist of religion, predicted the death of religion?s relevancy in city landscapes. Religion generally was on its way out as a culture-shaper, he says. But in Restless Gods: The Renaissance of Religion in Canada (2002), Bibby suggests that questions of meaning and purpose are beginning to revitalize religious communities. Among other watershed events, 9/11 has profoundly demonstrated that faith cannot be ignored. The American sociologist Peter Berger agrees when he notes: "I think what I and most other sociologists wrote in the 1960s about secularization was a mistake. It wasn't a crazy theory. There was some evidence for it. But I think it was basically wrong. Most of the world today is not secular."The connection between church and city has therefore not been so much absent as under-theorized, or even anti-theorized. But if biblical Christianity demands concern for cities, then it is time for Christians and urban leaders to re-examine the connection.New Urbanism and an Urban Village Vanguard New Urbanism is one lens by which to examine this link. It is not an exclusively Christian effort, though it reflects many Christian concerns. It is a coalition of architects, developers, planners, journalists, and citizen activists who are committed to developing a physical environment that supports human flourishing. According to Eric Jacobsen in Sidewalks in the Kingdom: New Urbanism and the Christian Faith, the New Urbanist model is distinct because it articulates a new model for shared human life. It is also unique because unlike other more utopian efforts, New Urbanist projects have managed to be financially viable and have been favorably received by many communities.It is nevertheless difficult to pin New Urbanism down as a design method or a particular pattern of development. The New Urbanist commitment to context-sensitive design means that projects are oriented around local topography and climate, as well as the tastes and values of the community itself. In its emphasis on community, New Urbanism also rejects more atomistic approaches that see projects as self-contained. A city is organic, not a patchwork of hermetically-sealed individual buildings. It is an urban fabric, the whole of which must be considered.Although it?s tricky to fix something as historically entrenched as the church into more recent innovations like New Urbanism, the principles below aren't new. The concern of New Urbanism for community, whole development, and human flourishing is not merely the concern of the institutional church; it forms the matrix of what we Christians call ?good news.? In many ways what is striking is not why municipal leaders and New Urbanists should look at churches as allies, but rather, why church leaders have been conspicuously absent from this dialogue. Can community be built from within the physical form of traditional towns without under-girding social structures? What part can churches play in New Urbanism and the revitalization of urban spaces? I want to suggest three critical ways that churches can answer these questions.1. Befriending the Stranger "People," comments Jean Vanier, the founder of L'Arche, a community for those with intellectual disabilities, "are yearning to discover community. We have had enough of loneliness, independence and competition? (National Catholic Reporter). Urban life is fast-paced, with penalties for those who fail to keep up. Perhaps the most important role a church can play in contemporary urban centers is as simple as presence."I had a friend who, not long ago, was in Vancouver working in its East End, a notoriously drug-ridden and depressed region. One day she was talking with a man at a street church, who had been dry for a month. "How'd you come out of it?" she asked."Jus' comin' here for a hotdog every night, and the kindness they showed - just people accepting me, shaking my hand, saying hi."Surprised, she asked, "So all those little things are making a difference?""Oh yea," he said, "just givin' someone the time of day is where it all starts." My friend spent a summer learning that "just giving someone the time of day," just being present, can be all the difference. Jean Vanier writes that presence is being present to people who are fragile, and being present merely to one another.However, New Urbanism is instructive in informing churches that this kind of radical presence means more than putting up a building and filling it. The kind of presence that Vanier is talking about connects churches to a local fabric of its weakest members. This practice of presence is for "those who believe that the renewal of the Church and the unity of the followers of Jesus will come as we serve those who appear to us as strange, different, the unwanted and lonely, and as we learn to befriend our own poverty, the strange and the lonely within us."Cardinal Ethegary adds that the "renewal of the Church always comes as we dare to live a life of covenant with the poor." Churches, like people, must make a pilgrimage of learning to befriend the poverty within and without, to live with the kind of strength and integrity upon which true urban renewal can be built. In some cities this has meant a young mothers' program, in others a refugee sponsorship program, and in still others special needs projects.2. Spiritual Capital and the Urban Network Historically, churches have been an entrenched part of the community's economic and social infrastructure. Churches raise significant revenue, a great deal of which is funneled into mission. Statistics support the intuitive notion that people invest according to their values, and that values are often defined religiously. Robert Woodberry defines spiritual capital as "resources that are created or that people have access to when people invest in religion as religion." Churches draw significant capital into their orbits, and provide access to it for society's weakest members.The church not only creates spiritual capital, but social capital as well. Christian identity cuts across every other dividing line found in urban neighborhoods. David Sucher, in his book City Comforts: How to Build an Urban Village, tells how the former mayor of Seattle, Norman B. Rice, tried to make an urban village part of his administrative planning. The term might seem like an oxymoron. "How," Sucher writes, "can you have a place that feels like a village and like a big city at the same time? People want the diversity, choice, and independence of the urban. And the intimacy of the village."The task of cities, Sucher continues, has been made more complicated than it needs to be. It is no more complex than making people comfortable, the same task faced by the host of a party. Churches can create this level of human comfort, but too often they are complicit in creating forbidding, intimidating public spaces.It is time to imagine how churches can help cultivate an urban village. Kathleen Madden, in How to Turn a Place Around: A Handbook for Creating Successful Public Spaces (2000), suggests the following characteristics for a successful public place:A high proportion of people in groups. A higher than average proportion of women (because women - according to Madden - tend to be more discriminating about the places they use, perhaps because of choosiness about the seating available, perhaps because of their perceptions about safety). The presence of people of different ages over the course of a day. A variety of possible activities rather than a single use for the place. Public shows of affection. Madden writes, "There is generally more smiling, kissing, embracing, holding and shaking of hands, and so forth in good public spaces than in those that are problematic."3. For the Art of It: Cities and Sacred SpaceThere is an old legend about the conversion of Russia to Orthodoxy in 988 A.D. Prince Volodymyr of Kiev wanted to convert to a common religion to unite his people. He sent messengers to the lands of Catholicism, Islam, Judaism, and Orthodoxy. On their return they reported their impressions, favorable but not overly so of the great religions, until they related the Orthodox Christians of Constantinople, and the Hagia Sophia. Speaking of their worship in the Great Church they said, "We knew not whether we were in heaven or on earth. It would be impossible to find on earth any splendor greater than this. Never shall we be able to forget so great a beauty." There is something remarkable about a conversion based on the discovery of God through architecture.The sacredness of such space is not about God living only in those places, but rather about us setting space apart. While temples house gods, the Christian notion of church is communal, flesh and blood. The church as a building is a symbolic extension of this community, and as a physical space where Christians come together. Our building shapes, by means of design and placement, how we understand what it means to be a community."Buildings [are] like human beings," writes David Sucher. "Conversations between buildings, as among humans, are a poignant sign of neighborliness. It is the height of rudeness - though all too often the expected norm in cities - for neighbors to speak not a word to each other for years on end. Buildings that do not talk to their neighbors are also rude." In many city neighborhoods, churches can be good neighbors by re-inhabiting existing church buildings, or by creating new buildings that respond to the surrounding space - finding ways of fitting into the context. The church should see it as part of its vocation to repair the urban fabric by repairing and constructing its own building in such a way that the neighborhood is aesthetically and socially knitted together. The physical institution of the church and its neighborhood should be an icon of the social cohesion of the church and its community. Polite architectural conversation can be as easy as doing simple things, like preserving green space and cultivating a garden, showcasing life and vibrancy."We need Christians and churches everywhere there are people," writes Tim Keller, pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church (PCA) in New York City in "A New Kind of Urban Christian" (Christianity Today, May 2006). Urban renewal, requires the kind of vision and action that churches and people of faith possess. It is an urban vision firmly entrenched in the knowledge of the creator God, acted out faithfully in response to His Word, with contextual reflection. There is almost no limit to the imaginative manifestations that such a church can take. But churches and Christians must begin to take this kind of earthy Christianity, which bespeaks such pertinence to architecture, community, and transit more seriously if they are to realize a vision of urban centers built and sustained for human flourishing and the glory of God.

In a uniquely Canadian twist, the Alberta government may soon put an end to a royalties regime that achieved the goal of accelerating oil sands development and, in the process, turned the province's economy into the envy of the world.That's not to say that oil sands production will cease. It won't. But if the recommendations of a provincial government-appointed review panel are adopted, it definitely will slow. Everyone is agreed on that, including the royalty review panel's chairman, Bill Hunter. The question is whether activity will ease back to a more normal and yet still healthy pace or whether it will stutter and stall as capital looks for other jurisdictions that are as out of line with the international norm as the panel fears Alberta has been.The panel's report, embraced by some and branded as irresponsible by others, indicates that Albertans, as owners of the resource, have not been getting enough and should - at current prices - be taking in $2-billion more annually in royalties. It recommends:Increasing the people's take from oil sands revenue to 64 per cent from 47 per cent;Hiking royalties after payouts on development costs to 33 per cent from 25 per cent, plus a price-sensitive tax on each barrel of production from startup;Banning "grandfathering" of current projects and energy developments;Increasing price-related royalty caps to reflect current oil and gas prices.Premier Ed Stelmach, who recently described how difficult it had been to "give away $10-billion" to his municipalities, says he will decide in a matter of weeks on how much of this, if any, he will implement. His promise that he will not be intimidated is a pretty clear indication, however, that he is going to at least adopt parts of the package. The "problem," according to the review panel, is that Alberta's royalty structure has been far more beneficial to private industry than is the case elsewhere. (This has prompted serious people to weigh Alberta's merits against socialist and recovering Communist jurisdictions such as Angola, Venezuela and Russia - apparent examples of where the people's interests are more paramount).These differences have inspired opposition politicians and, for instance, the respected left-leaning Pembina Institute to point to the panel's report as proof that Albertans have been shortchanged over the past decade.Finding the appropriate balance is always important in these matters. Yet, it does seem a bit of a stretch to imagine that Albertans, who live in a deficit- and debt-free jurisdiction, with multibillion-dollar budget surpluses, have somehow been ripped off. Alberta has experienced close to the most rapid economic expansion, job growth etc. in the world in recent years. Workers making $100,000 in Alberta take home $5,000 a year more on average than Canadians in most other provinces, pay relatively modest property taxes and zero provincial sales tax. It is perhaps the most prosperous society in the course of human history, one in which the biggest problem facing its government hasn't been money but what to do with its massive surpluses (tax cuts oddly having been ruled out).If Albertans have been harmed by past public policy, well, what can you say other than what does a fellow have to do to get in the queue to be so victimized? Regardless, it is apparent that the leaves are falling from the boom-town tree. Already this year, drilling has slowed significantly. Low natural gas prices have combined with weak equity markets and massive cost increases so that the province's take from land sales is expected to do little better than $1.4-billion this year, compared with $3.43-billion in 2006 and $2.26-billion in 2005. The Canadian dollar's rise against its U.S. counterpart makes it likely that, despite rising oil prices, companies will be hard-pressed to increase profits beyond what they are today other than through cost containment (and we all know what that means).The review panel has placed the people's hands firmly on the throat of the golden goose. Much will be determined by how hard they squeeze.

On October 10th, the voters of Ontario will pass judgment not only on Dalton McGuinty’s Liberal government; they will also vote on whether or not to change the way we vote. In many respects, this is more important than the election itself. Under our current system, variously labeled “single-member-plurality,” “winner-take-all,” and “first-past-the-post” (FPTP), the province is divided into 107 electoral districts or ridings, each of which sends a representative to the provincial legislature at Queen’s Park in Toronto. Electoral contests within each riding are settled on the basis of plurality – that is, on which candidate receives more votes than any other single candidate. It is not necessary for that candidate to have received an absolute majority (50 percent plus one) of the votes cast. This means that in a closely-contested, three-way race it is possible for a candidate to win an election over the opposition of up to two-thirds of the voters. Even where the parties are not evenly matched, it is hardly unusual for the “winning” candidate to receive well under a majority. In this respect Ontario has not had a true majority government elected since 1937. The Ontario Citizens’ Assembly on Electoral Reform is proposing, not an outright abandonment of our current system, but its modification in a more representative direction. Under the mixed-member proportional system offered by the Assembly, Ontarians will have two votes, one for a party list and one for a local candidate. The province will be divided into 90 ridings, with up to 39 additional seats to be added to that number. The election for a single member to represent a riding will still be based on FPTP. But if, when the total votes are counted, a party remains under-represented, as the federal Progressive Conservatives were in 1993, its share of seats will be topped up from the party list side, ensuring that the partisan composition of the Legislature roughly reflects levels of support in the electorate. If a party does not receive at least 3 percent of the total vote, it will receive no seats from the party list. This is to ensure that there are not too many small parties in the Legislature, especially those that might represent fringe groups. What are the benefits of MMP? To begin with, it treats an election, not as a horse race with winners and losers, but as a means of measuring support for parties and their programs. If, say, 20 percent of the electorate votes for the Green Party, it will receive roughly 20 percent of the seats in the Legislature. One opponent of MMP complained that it rewards a party that cannot win riding elections. That misses the point. Democracy is about representation, and our current system penalizes those parties with a genuine following but whose support is too geographically diffuse. Second, it combines the best features of two electoral systems: FPTP and a more unadulterated form of proportional representation (PR). Both the Netherlands and Israel have a straight party list system, in which voters cast their ballots for a list rather than a local candidate. Most Canadians would agree that this would be inappropriate for a country like Canada, with its huge expanse of territory and diverse population. Ontario itself is scarcely less diverse than Canada as a whole. A member of the Citizens’ Assembly with whom I recently spoke observed that most people they consulted were strongly in favour of retaining local representation in the Legislature. This they did not wish to give up. Under MMP they will not have to. But they will have the added benefit of knowing that, if their favoured candidate loses the riding, their party list votes will nevertheless count. Third, MMP is likely to boost voter turnout, as PR has done in a number of democracies around the world. This is not just an educated guess; the relationship between electoral systems and voter turnout has been demonstrated empirically by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) in Stockholm (http://www.idea.int/vt/survey/index.cfm). This organization maintains a continually updated database of election results since 1945 in 171 states. These data indicate a positive correlation between PR and a high voter turnout. Where voters’ choices are limited and where their votes are regularly wasted on losing candidates, the incentive to vote at all is weak. On the other hand, where there is some expectation that one’s vote really will count for something, people are more likely to go to the polls. (See my “Voter Turnout and Competitive Politics” http://www.cpjustice.org/stories/storyReader$509). Fourth, MMP is likely to break the monopoly of the two major parties, the Liberals and Conservatives, which have become used to relying on the distortions of FPTP to cling to power. New parties will almost certainly arise and minor parties will become stronger. If they have sufficient support to overcome the 3 percent hurdle, they will send MPPs to the Legislature. Likely beneficiaries will be the New Democratic Party, the Greens and the Family Coalition Party. Fifth, contrary to some expectations, MMP will not entail permanent minority government. Because single-party majority governments will become increasingly unlikely, parties will have to form coalition governments, which will be made up of more than one party. The closest we came to this in Ontario was the two-year accord between the Liberal and New Democratic Parties in 1985, the difference being that there were no New Democrats in David Peterson’s cabinet. Here is what MMP will not do: it will not cure all the ills of democracy. It will not end political corruption, which is rooted in the rebellious human heart. It will not bring about perfect justice. However, it will help to empower previously under-represented voices and give them a hearing in the corridors of political power. It will also offer a potent check on the power of the premier, whose position will be dependent on more than just leadership over his own party. Ontarians would do well to vote, not to get rid of FPTP, but to modify it so as to represent better the diversity of the province’s population. Vote for MMP on October 10th. David Koyzis is the Professor of Political Science at Redeemer University College in Ancaster, Ontario.

On Oct. 10, Ontarians will be called on to vote twice. They will (or won’t) vote in the general election that decides who sits in the next provincial parliament and who governs Ontario. And, they will be called on to vote in a referendum to say “Yes” or “No” to a new electoral system for Ontario provincial elections: “mixed member proportional” representation or “MMP.”What is MMP? Here’s the gist: instead of one vote, Ontarians would cast two votes. One vote would be cast for the local candidate of their choice in the electoral district where they live. The other vote would be cast for the political party of their choice. In each riding, the candidate who won the most votes would become the member of Provincial Parliament (MPP), just like now. But seats would be reserved for the political parties to choose the other MPPs based on how many votes the parties got. Why MMP? Supporters argue that MMP would result in a provincial parliament that better reflected each party’s popular vote. Pro-life supporters of MMP argue it would allow a pro-life party to put a pro-life MPP in the provincial parliament. Confused? You should be. What is really needed is not MMP reform, but “MPP reform.” What Ontario needs – what all governments need – is elected officials who speak and vote with the courage of conviction.MMP gives political parties and their leaders more power, not less. MMP gives local party members less power, not more. Now, the local riding associations of the parties select candidates. The process is open to any party member eligible to run for office. A party leader can impose candidates, but it’s bad politics for a leader to do so. It’s considered “anti-democratic.”So, why would people who want a “more democratic” system support MMP? MMP lets the party leader make the call, not party members. MMP is anti-democratic.Pro-life Ontarians can join any political party, organize to win their party’s candidate selection in any riding, stand for election, and win – with “smarts” and hard work. The problem is not just getting elected. It’s what some pro-life people do when they achieve office.Party discipline is part of the reason. If an MPP wants to curry favour with the caucus and party leader, he or she must go along with what the leader wants in order to advance in the caucus ranks. “Go along to get along.” In our system, votes on budget bills and motions are “confidence votes.” Votes on other “money bills” – bills requiring spending or a tax increase – aren’t always, unless the leader makes them so. When members fail to vote with the leader and caucus on a confidence vote, they risk being kicked out of caucus. But very few votes are confidence votes. How would MMP change this? The short answer is, it won’t.Our system upholds “cabinet solidarity.” Every member of cabinet is expected to support the government’s position. If the premier declares the government’s position on a bill or motion, other cabinet members must vote the same way. If a cabinet member won’t, he must resign from cabinet. Sometimes opposition party leaders insist on the same solidarity for opposition critics, but not always. How would MMP change this? Same answer: it won’t.Our system distinguishes between ?government bills and motions? and ?private members? bills and motions.? A government bill or motion is introduced by a member of the cabinet. A private members? bill or motion is introduced by an MPP who is not in cabinet. An MPP isn?t required to ask his leader or caucus for permission to introduce a private members? bill. Traditionally, votes on private members? bills are free votes. They?re not confidence votes and they don?t require cabinet solidarity, unless the government takes a position. How would MMP change this? Again: it won?t.What the pro-life cause needs are more MPPs who set aside advancing their careers in caucus and cabinet and focus, instead, on advancing life and family as a political issue. We need more MPPs who argue for life and family inside caucus, in committees and the legislative assembly and in media and public meetings. We need more MPPs who recruit pro-life volunteers to their campaigns and hire pro-life staff and interns so the next generation of activists is put in place. We need more MPPs who table pro-life bills on funding, information, parental notification and others, so that the law becomes more pro-life ? to achieve what Augustine called ?proximate justice.?MMP? No, we need more MPPs who advance a culture of life movement that celebrates family life, the aspirations of youth and the wisdom of age ? that sees all human life as sacred. ?Vote life? ? not MMP.

Not since 1992, when Don Getty's Progressive Conservative government was polling in the 15-per-cent range, have Alberta Tories been so nervous.They're accustomed to periods of anxiety only when polls dip Tory support below 50 per cent; Premier Ed Stelmach's government is now wandering in the low to mid-30s. Catastrophic? Maybe. Irretrievable? Not yet. Recall that when Mr. Getty's government was at its lowest point, at least one famous poll indicated the New Democrats were approaching the cusp of power in this bastion of libertarian/neo-/paleo-con enterprise. A human gestation period later, the Ralph Klein Revolution swept into office by re-energizing the Tories and outrighting Laurence Decore's Liberals.Equally intriguing is that, as the allegiance to Mr. Stelmach's government erodes, support for the Liberals under Kevin Taft isn't increasing in a way that makes that party look like a serious alternative. Albertans, preoccupied with either making money or trying to figure out why they are not making the money everyone else is, are spilling into the "undecided" category - a clear sign that the old consensus is eroding and a new one may be about to be born in a radical way.That, after all, is our pattern of behaviour:Since its creation as a province in 1905, Alberta has been ruled in succession by Liberals, United Farmers, Social Credit and Progressive Conservatives.Every governing party has ruled for longer than 10 years. In the current case, the Tories have been in office since 1971.No party has gained power, lost it, then returned to power in a later election. In the case of the UFA and Socreds, the parties pretty much disappeared in a relatively short time.Parties have successfully reinvented themselves to revolutionize and avoid oblivion. Every time the governing party has been overthrown (admittedly only four times in 102 years), it was not defeated by the Official Opposition but by a new, unexpected agent. In other words, once you are a loser in Alberta, it has so far been impossible to become a winner.Neither the current governing party nor the Official Opposition has recent polling numbers that indicate strong levels of public confidence.Within this context and current conditions, it appears Alberta is primed for a significant change. People are open, politically lonely and available for the siren call of an alternative.Some will argue that this sense of infidelity might be different from the past as a result of the impact of immigration. But immigration is not new to Alberta. It has been a constant feature - except during the Great Depression (1930s) and the Great National Energy Program Recession (1980s) - that so far hasn't proved to have any diluting impact on the generally entrepreneurial culture. In other words, neither change in population numbers nor political party supremacy necessarily equates to change in people's inclinations.One suspects that most Albertans still hope Mr. Stelmach's government will give them a reason to believe.If not, the option on the left is that a coalition of New Democrats and Liberals will form to capitalize on Tory ennui. On the right, the options are: the Alberta Alliance, which, under the guidance of sole MLA Paul Hinman, outperformed the New Democrats in most Calgary urban ridings and finished second ahead of the Liberals in a great many rural ridings; and the Wild Rose party, which is still gathering signatures to make itself official but has the backing of credible people such as senator-elect Link Byfield. The fact that both the Alliance and Wild Rose are ignored by the major media does stir memories of the early days of Reform. But if that same magic is there, it's not yet apparent.Alberta is not a colonial annex to Confederation any more. It is a powerful player whose thump factor grows with every passing year. What is happening here isn't exactly clear, but trust that, when it takes shape, the impact will be profound. That is our way.

Be not afraid! - John Paul II, 1978  You turn if you want to. The lady's not for turning. - Margaret Thatcher, 1980 I urge you to beware the temptation of pride - the temptation of blithely declaring yourselves above it all and label both sides equally at fault, to ignore the facts of history and the aggressive impulses of an evil empire, to simply call the arms race a giant misunderstanding and thereby remove yourself from the struggle between right and wrong and good and evil. - Ronald Reagan, 1983John Paul II, Margaret Thatcher, and Ronald Reagan personified their faith traditions. John Paul II was a post-Vatican II Catholic. He was profoundly influenced by the philosophical theology of personalism grounded in the doctrine of Imago Dei that sees every human person as created in the image of God and, therefore, of inestimable value. Margaret Thatcher was a Great Awakening Christian. She was shaped from childhood by a Methodist faith that taught, "Earn all you can, save all you can and give all you can," modelled by her father, a grocer and mayor, and that sought solutions to the problems of humankind grounded in helping others toward self-reliance. Ronald Reagan was a Second Awakening Christian. His approach to life was informed by a "Campbellite" Scottish common sense realism and its post-Calvinist confidence in the ability of people of good will to reason and to work together in pursuit of the good on first principles.John O'Sullivan served variously as an editor of the National Review, editorial consultant to the National Post and as an adviser to prime minister Margaret Thatcher. In this, his first book, O'Sullivan describes the leadership qualities of John Paul II, Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, exercised individually and in concert, and how these led to the defeat of communist totalitarianism and to a renewed confidence in the West. O'Sullivan frames his account with "spiritual biographies" of the three.He suggests that apart from recognizing how belief in God and how a faith commitment and perspective are central to each, we cannot understand their interpretations of contemporary events as they unfolded for a pope, a president and a prime minister, personally and globally. O'Sullivan implies, in turn, that the failure or refusal of many in the West to acknowledge the power of these commitments and perspectives effectively made the actions of this pope, this president and this prime minister incomprehensible and, even, seem nonsensical to them.O'Sullivan opens his book with a description of what amounts to "a two-front war": the expansionism and global ambition of Soviet totalitarianism on one side and the economic and cultural malaise of the West on the other. He offers a compelling account of the intransigence of what turned out to be the last gasp of Soviet ambition led by Leonid Brezhnev. This is put in counterpoint to John Paul II's cultural challenge mounted against the Polish communist regime. O'Sullivan paints a picture of a pope who preaches, not a political, but a cultural confrontation of Polish communism. John Paul taught Poles to refuse to accept the communist status quo as anything but an interregnum to which they should respond by living as faith-integral Catholics whose first loyalty was not to an all-encompassing state, but to an all-encompassing faith. His first instruction was delivered in his inaugural homily as pope, when John Paul quoted the admonition of Christ to his disciples: "Be not afraid!"The careers of Thatcher and Reagan are also put in context. It was not just counter-intuitive that someone of Thatcher's public policy outlook could be elected prime minister, but as leader of her party. Britain was living in a post-Imperial twilight of regress from confidence in foreign policy and in Britons' ability to compete with the world. The country that gave the world Adam Smith, the industrial revolution and (with the Dutch) invented capitalism was the sick man of Europe. But Thatcher advocated "the vigorous virtues" - Methodist virtues - of hard work, prudence, thrift and self-reliance. In 1970s Britain, Thatcher was deemed "too conservative." O'Sullivan traces the kernel of "the Reagan Doctrine" to the differing perspectives of Kissinger and Reagan on withdrawal of U.S. forces from South Vietnam in 1975. Reagan echoed Kissinger's urging U.S. congressmen to approve military supplies, already promised to the Thieu regime. Both worried about the impact of withdrawal on U.S. alliances elsewhere and "the stain on national honour." But Reagan differed sharply on the effectiveness, and even legitimacy, of détente as a defining foreign policy doctrine to inform dealings with the Russians for two reasons: the Soviets consistently got the better deal and, far more serious, détente gave an undeserved whiff of respectability and permanence to what Reagan considered to be "a form of insanity -- a temporary aberration." O'Sullivan calls this difference "an almost spiritual one."He describes at length the co-ordination of efforts between the three, although Thatcher and John Paul did not meet. Thatcher generally supported Reagan's foreign policy approach and sometimes led the way. Even when they disagreed, there was affection. During a phone call as Thatcher argued her case, Reagan held up the receiver to those in the room and said, "Isn't she wonderful?" Reagan lent military support to Thatcher for the Falklands War and Thatcher accepted INF missiles and allowed American planes to land on British soil. John Paul was convinced that Reagan was an advocate of disarmament and lent his moral support. Reagan channelled money and other support to Poland's Solidarity movement and briefed the pope on the Russians. O'Sullivan interprets John Paul's encyclical, Centesimus Annus (1991), as an endorsement of "the new economy" created by Reagan and Thatcher's reforms, consistent with his personalist understanding of humankind. When the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops issued its pastoral letter, "The Challenge of Peace" (1983), the first and second drafts equated pacifism and "just war" while the third and final draft - as a result of the Vatican's intervention - "made clear that the just war tradition was the sole authentically Catholic one." One point of difference highlighted is the Reagan and Thatcher positions on "the Strategic Defense Initiative." O'Sullivan argues that Reagan saw SDI as a means of eliminating nuclear arms and, therefore, made it a condition of disarmament. Reagan offered to co-operate with the Russians on SDI development, including sharing technology advances. But he refused to halt SDI research and testing, even in return for nuclear disarmament holus bolus , as offered by Gorbachev at Reykjavik in 1986. As the U.S. summit party departed Iceland on Air Force One, Reagan was told by Charles Zwick, "Ronnie, you just won the Cold War. They admitted they can't compete. They don't have the money to fight the dollar." But Gorbachev himself had already publicly announced "the beginning of the end of the Cold War." What he may not have realized was that this also signalled the end of the Soviet Union.There are some historical footnotes uncovered by O'Sullivan's access to secret, Soviet-era documents available to him by way of the Gorbachev Foundation archive, prior to President Vladimir Putin's ending access to it in 2003. He also relied on Vladimir Bukovsky's account, among others. O'Sullivan cites discussions the radical British unionist Arthur Scargill had with the Soviets and their funding his efforts in 1983 to shut down Britain and defeat Thatcher. Chilling are the accounts of U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy's advising the Soviet leadership on how to deal with Reagan and Kennedy's overture to the short-lived general secretary Yuri Andropov! Without using the term, O'Sullivan suggests that John Paul, Ronald Reagan, and Margaret Thatcher's survival of assassination attempts was providential. The loss of any of the three might well have delayed the end of the Cold War and the fall of the Soviet Empire. Those who would follow their models of leadership will do well emulate their faith commitments to that providence. In the words of John O'Sullivan's adaptation of Lady Thatcher's eulogy for Ronald Reagan: "We have an advantage that they never had. We have their example."  Russ Kuykendall is a senior researcher at the Work Research Foundation and is the eldest of his parents' six children.

Some years ago, Calgary cancelled its Cowboy Festival of poetry and all things western. It's difficult to remember the reasons stated, if any, at the time, but it was one of those delightful little pieces of culture that had fallen out of fashion. It too easily reinforced stereotypes and was deemed unsuited to the "new West" image of a modern "sophisticated" city. It was very nice but, really, what would the neighbours think?Nothing new took the place of the cowboy poets. They were just left on the cultural doorstep - children deemed to have lost their legitimacy and about whom we were never to speak again. After all, a lot of us in this country - including nouveau Calgarians - have a certain amount of difficulty viewing cowboy culture as something "Canadian."It has always been viewed a little suspiciously because most of us formed our view of cowboys through the lens of Hollywood, which gave us a distinctly American view of the genre. Americans had cowboys but, well, we had Mounties, and let's face it: Within our culture, there is nothing more un-Canadian than something that might be American. Just ask an American immigrant how free he feels to celebrate his diversity, and you get the picture.The truth is, cowboy culture and this week's Stampede is to Calgary what Celtic music is to Nova Scotia - an inescapable part of its history and foundation. The Bar U Ranch, for instance, is not one of Canada's better known or promoted historical sites. Nestled in the foothills about 60 kilometres southwest of Calgary, it is a monument to those two generations who lived, loved and died before the barbed wire went up and the wonder of the open range disappeared both for first and second nations people. At one time, the Bar U's population of three or so dozen people constituted the largest settlement between Calgary and Fort Macleod. It had a post office, a Royal North-West Mounted Police detachment, and (not a lot of people know this) was for a time the home of Harry Longabaugh, who, after moving to Calgary and working in the saloon at the Grand Central Hotel, returned to the U.S. as the Sundance Kid.Another 150 kilometres or so to the south is Cowley, near where the John Hoise wagon train of 12 men, women and children, on their way from Fort Benton to Fort Edmonton, was massacred in 1867 by a war party led by Medicine Calf of the Blood First Nation. Legend has it that a Longview bar once displayed a rifle bearing a serial number that identified it as belonging to a soldier in the U.S. 7th Cavalry. Apparently, it was brought north by one of the Sioux warriors who had triumphed in the Battle of the Little Big Horn. In fact, in southern Alberta, we not only have people who can trace their heritage to those same Sioux warriors, but we have cacti, scorpions, and rattlesnakes.And yes, whether or not we choose to acknowledge it, we have cowboys.Their numbers are in decline, but the values they maintain - the ones that should not and cannot be abandoned - live on. I golfed with two of them recently. One was a chiropractor, the other an exercise kinesiologist. They were former bull riders, compact in build like Formula One drivers and fighter pilots. As it always is with cowboys, they were transparently honest, disarmingly friendly and in possession of more work ethic and intelligence - in other words, character - than the God, guts and guns stereotype that so troubles today's faux urban sophisticates.The Canadian cowboy way built this city. As cowgirl poet Doris Daley puts it: "We knew drought and fire and heartache, we knew fat and we knew bone/ But we were silver lining people and we never rode alone."

There have been times when the most difficult thing about getting elected as a Conservative in Calgary was winning the nomination.This spring Brian Heninger won the Tory nomination for Calgary-Elbow - the seat vacated by retired premier Ralph Klein - by acclamation. Mr. Heninger's ambitions and talents were both laudable, as was an optimism that few other potential and ambitious Calgary Conservatives shared. But Calgary-Elbow had Liberal "upset" written all over it from the moment Mr. Klein's retirement was announced - and in Tuesday by-election Mr. Heninger lost to Liberal candidate Craig Cheffins. Calgary-Elbow, despite being held by the Conservatives since 1971, has been in play before. In making the transition from Calgary mayor to provincial MLA in Don Getty's government, Mr. Klein won the seat over Liberal Gib Clark by a mere 823 votes - roughly the size of Mr. Heninger's loss to Mr. Cheffins. Overcoming the relatively posh constituency's suspicions of his working-class roots, Mr. Klein then went on to more comfortable victories as premier, although his plurality slumped to 2,020 votes in the uninspired 2004 election.Into the latest electoral mix were thrown: Calgary's prolonged sulk over Edmonton-area Ed Stelmach's ascension to the premier's office to replace Mr. Klein; the low voter turnout typically associated with by-elections; and a series of increasingly angry criticisms of the provincial government by a Calgary mayor staunchly committed to his causes.Given all that, it comes as little surprise the Liberals were able to win this seat, particularly within Calgary's reality.Ever since Peter Lougheed's Progressive Conservatives swept to power in 1971 as the preferred party to the left of the Social Credit dynasty, Calgary has been a generally happy place for Conservative candidates. But by no means has it been as monolithically Tory as voting patterns created by Mr. Klein's populism from the mid-1990s until recently indicated.In 1986, for instance, Calgary elected 15 Tories (some narrowly), one Liberal and two - count 'em - New Democrats. Three years later, the election produced 13 Tories, three Liberals and the same two New Democrats. Liberals still managed to win three of 20 Calgary ridings in 1993, after Mr. Klein had become premier, although "Ralph's" popularity with the working man wiped out the New Democrats.Much of this context gets lost in discussions about the nature of change in Calgary. Liberal victories these days are commonly viewed as the result of newcomers importing their politics to the mix or - particularly among diehard Liberals prone to seeing themselves in the most fashionable intellectual categories - indications of a new urban sophistication. The truth - and there is much data to support this - is that Calgary is historically a much more pluralistic city politically than it has been fashionable to assume. The election of a clean slate of Tories, such as occurred in the 2001 election, hasn't been the norm since Mr. Lougheed's days and has never been the case when a non-Calgarian is premier. Even in 1997, when Mr. Klein appeared at the absolute height of his powers, Calgary Buffalo was retained by Liberal Gary Dixon.This week's by-election outcome is without doubt cause for Mr. Stelmach to be concerned about the health of the Tory franchise in Calgary. And it is a fabulous morale boost to the Liberals. But is Calgary changing so much that it is now possible to elect a Liberal? Well, maybe. But if it is, it might just be changing back to that which it was the last time a non-Calgarian was premier - a good but not yet great city full of a diversity of fresh ideas and established allegiances. Many other things have changed, but if we are to judge solely by its voting patterns, the current "new" Calgary looks an awful lot like the "old" Calgary of 20 years ago.PETER MENZIESPast publisher of the Calgary Herald and a senior fellow with the Work Research Foundation